Route reliability record
PBI→DCA
West Palm Beach to Washington
- Flights
- 1,690
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 857 mi
- Carriers
- 4
This route sits in the middle of the pack with a C. About seven flights in ten arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 8 points worse than the national rate of 77.3%. The late ones land an hour and a half behind schedule. That rests on 1,690 PBI to DCA flights, of which American Airlines flew 921 at 72.9% on time.
Best time to fly PBI to DCA: a 8am–11am departure, ideally on a Saturday. Flights in that window arrived on time 84.8% of the time and Saturday flights 79.7%, against 69.6% for the route overall.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.3%, so this route runs 8 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 77 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
69.6%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,649 completed flights
Avg delay
90 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.07%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
American
72.9% on time across 921 flights
These figures cover 1,690 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 14.2% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally.
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Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on PBI to DCA
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. American Airlines arrives on time 72.9% of the time; JetBlue Airways manages 64.4%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 689 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 76 | 77.3% | 54 min | 1.32% | B |
| Envoy Airthin sample | 4 | 75.0% | 120 min | 0.00% | B+ |
| American Airlines | 921 | 72.9% | 97 min | 1.95% | C |
| JetBlue Airways | 689 | 64.4% | 86 min | 2.32% | D |
American leads JetBlue by 9 points. Real, but small enough that a better departure time on the weaker carrier can outweigh it.
Flight by flight
Flights on PBI to DCA
The flight numbers below flew this route at least 250 times in the period, busiest first. Each has its own record, with its schedule and delay causes.
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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly West Palm Beach to Washington
Every airline on this route and on the routes between nearby airports, ranked by how often a scheduled flight actually operated and arrived on time. 4 of the top 5 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. FLL → IADFort Lauderdale to Washington | United Airlines | 85.4% | 85.9% | 0.57% | 8am–11am, Tue | — |
| 2. PBI → BWIWest Palm Beach to Baltimore | Southwest Airlines | 80.0% | 81.2% | 1.49% | 5am–8am, Wed | — |
| 3. FLL → BWIFort Lauderdale to Baltimore | Southwest Airlines | 71.9% | 73.5% | 2.18% | 5am–8am, Wed | — |
| 4. PBI → DCAWest Palm Beach to Washington | American Airlines | 71.5% | 72.9% | 1.95% | 8am–11am, Tue | — |
| 5. FLL → DCAFort Lauderdale to Washington | JetBlue Airways | 67.1% | 69.2% | 2.97% | 5am–8am, Wed | B6 1480 06:45 |
Success is the share of scheduled flights that operated and arrived less than 15 minutes late, so a cancelled flight counts against it. “(route)” means the best time comes from every carrier on the route rather than this airline alone.
Departure window
The best time of day to leave
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 28 points, against 9 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am21 flights—
- 8am–11am281 flights84.8%
- 11am–2pm483 flights73.0%
- 2pm–5pm363 flights57.2%
- 5pm–8pm398 flights64.0%
- 8pm–5am144 flights71.5%
Scale runs 50% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the morning departure. Flights leaving between 8am–11am arrive on time 84.8% of the time, against 57.2% for the afternoon window. That is 28 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 11am–2pm window is the busiest, with 483 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter PBI to DCA by airline, time, month and day
Pick a breakdown and a carrier. The dashed mark on each row is the same slice for every US flight.
On PBI to DCA, the best departure window is 8am–11am at 84.8% on time and the worst is 2pm–5pm at 57.2%, a wide gap of 27.6 points. All US flights leaving 8am–11am ran 83.9%.
- 5–8am—
- 8–11am84.8%
- 11am–2pm73.0%
- 2–5pm57.2%
- 5–8pm64.0%
- 8pm–5am71.5%
best all US flightsScale 50% to 95%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 18 points from best month to worst, which is wide. An annual average tells you very little about the week you are actually flying, so read the strip rather than the headline if your dates are fixed.
February is the weak month at 63.8% on time, against 81.8% in May. Winter delays cluster: a single storm system can account for most of a month's shortfall, so an average December hides both very good weeks and genuinely unflyable days. January was the busiest month here, with 211 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 79.7% on time and Sunday the weakest at 58.7%, a spread of 21 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 55% of the 45,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 55%Late-arriving aircraft
- 23%National Airspace System
- 21%Carrier
- 1%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
55% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 45,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 55 to one. The split is drawn from 45,042 reported delay minutes.
The practical consequence: the 8am–11am departure is the one that starts clean. Its aircraft has no earlier leg to be late from, which is exactly why that window shows 84.8% on time here.
Cancellations sit at 2.07% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.36%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
14.2% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally. Ninety minutes is the honest minimum for a connection here, and two hours if the onward flight is on a separate ticket.
The 857 miles between these two airports put this in the middle of the US network, around two and a half to three hours of block time. That is enough cruise to absorb a ten-minute late pushback and not enough to absorb thirty.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 73.9% on time across 1,689 flights, 4 points above this direction. Departure banks, aircraft rotations and the congestion at each end all differ, so scoring the two directions together would average away a real 4 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 1,690 flights, enough that the headline rate is stable to within roughly a point. The hour-block and month splits divide that further, so read the thinner bars with more caution than the headline.
Work out the risk of missing a connection in DCA after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. May runs 81.8% on time and February 63.8%, a swing of 18 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of February before you think about anything else. 1,649 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
PBI to DCA questions
How often is PBI to DCA delayed?
Roughly one flight in three arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 30.4% of the 1,690 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by an hour and a half on average.
Which airline is most reliable on PBI to DCA?
American Airlines leads at 72.9% on time across 921 flights. JetBlue Airways is at the other end on 64.4%, a gap of 9 points. Sample size matters as much as the percentage: a rate built from a few hundred flights moves around far more than one built from ten thousand.
What time of day has the fewest delays on PBI to DCA?
The 8am–11am departure window is the strongest at 84.8% on time. The 2pm–5pm window is the weakest at 57.2%, 28 points behind. Later departures inherit delays from earlier flights the same aircraft has already flown, which is why the curve slopes the way it does.
How bad are February delays on PBI to DCA?
February is the weakest month at 63.8% on time, compared with 81.8% in May. Across the year that is 18 points between the best and worst months. Moving flexible dates out of that month is one of the few things that reliably helps.
Related
Where to go next
- DCA to PBI — the return legseparate record
- Palm Beach International (PBI) delay statistics
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- American Airlines on PBI to DCA72.9%
- JetBlue Airways on PBI to DCA64.4%
- PBI to ATL, a related route82.7%
- BOS to DCA, a related route72.6%
- PBI to EWR, a related route75.8%
- Republic Airways on-time record77.3%
- Envoy Air on-time record75.0%
- American Airlines on-time record72.9%
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
Direction matters. PBI to DCA and DCA to PBI are scored separately because they are separate operations, with different departure banks and different aircraft. Compare the return leg.
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Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, September 2025 to August 2026. Last updated ; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.